In terms of restricting access to abortion rights, the Supreme Court in Planned Parenthood v. Casey gave states a broad license to pass nearly any conceivable kind of restriction so long as that restriction did not pose an undue burden on a woman's right to chose to terminate a pregnancy. When faced with the question of what constitutes an undue burden, the federal judiciary has overwhelmingly come down on the side of supporting restrictions at the expense of women's access to abortion care.

We've seen this most recently when the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals held that mandating invasive and medically-unnecessary ultrasounds prior to an abortion did not pose an undue burden on a woman seeking an abortion. We saw it again when the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals found that forcing women to listen to misleading and inaccurate medical disclosures designed to persuade them from having an abortion was also not an undue burden on that woman. But, according to the Ninth Circuit, there is a limit to how a state can restrict abortion access and that limit appears to be criminally prosecuting those women who seek and have abortions. . . .